All Annotations of [Preview]

saved by20 people, first byBill Wolff on 2007-09-25, last byMike Wesch on 2008-05-28

• But the fans – raised on the unreality of reality TV and with the role-playing ethos of the Web – seemed to take the revelation in stride.
• But the fans – raised on the unreality of reality TV and with the role-playing ethos of the Web – seemed to take the revelation in stride.
• 
• Miles, it's time you quit being a doctor," he said. "We just passed 200,000
  views."
• ithin 48 hours, the video had half a million views.
  • on 2008-02-13 Meyerb15
    How did people catch on to watching this video?
• 
• hadn't taken them long to figure out, by trial and error, what worked in this new genre. Viewers wanted family and relationship drama mixed with a rich, mysterious backstory that could be explored and debated.
  >
  The YouTube community was sucked into the plot and speculated endlessly about
  >
  Bree's faith. Some thought she was Mormon; others insisted she was a Satanist.
  >
  Another group tried to figure out where she lived: The leading guess was
  >
  somewhere in the Midwest. Viewers spent hours Googling the possibilities and
  >
  posting their results on YouTube.
  >
• It hadn't taken them long to figure out, by trial and error, what worked in this new genre. Viewers wanted family and relationship drama mixed with a rich, mysterious backstory that could be explored and debated.
• explored
• The YouTube community was sucked into the plot and speculated endlessly about
  Bree's faith. Some thought she was Mormon; others insisted she was a Satanist.
  Another group tried to figure out where she lived: The leading guess was
  somewhere in the Midwest. Viewers spent hours Googling the possibilities and
  posting their results on YouTube.
• ^#4
  The
  YouTube community was sucked into the plot and speculated endlessly
  about
  
  
  
  Bree's
  faith. Some thought she was Mormon; others insisted she was a
  Satanist.
  
  
  
  Another
  group tried to figure out where she lived: The leading guess was
  
  
  
  
  somewhere
  in the Midwest. Viewers spent hours Googling the possibilities
  and
  
  
  
  posting
  their results on YouTube.
• That couldn't have happened on television. A conventional TV episode airs once at a certain time; even if it's great, it can only serve to attract viewers to future episodes. On YouTube, a video can be streamed at any time.
• The good ones are watched again and again, sending a clear message about what works and what doesn't.
  When "My Parents Suck …" broke 500,000 views, Beckett and Flinders realized this wasn't just an experiment or a setup for a film.
• It was a medium in its own right.
• everal people noted that everything in Bree's room seemed to come from Target. (One viewer annotated each item with its SKU number.) Could it be, one fan wondered, that the whole thing was an elaborate ad campaign for the retailer?
• several people noted that everything in Bree's room seemed to come from Target
• (One viewer annotated each item with its SKU number.) Could it be, one fan wondered, that the whole thing was an elaborate ad
• Meanwhile, the online celebrity started spilling over into the real world. Rose was browsing for a book in Santa Monica after "My Parents Suck …" was posted and noticed two girls watching her closely. That night, Amanda received an email from a fan: "Hi Bree. My friend and I thought we saw you at the Barnes & Noble in Santa Monica, but it couldn't be you, right?"

• Meanwhile, the online celebrity started spilling over into the real world.
  Rose was browsing for a book in Santa Monica after "My Parents Suck …" was
  posted and noticed two girls watching her closely. That night, Amanda received
  an email from a fan: "Hi Bree. My friend and I thought we saw you at the Barnes
  & Noble in Santa Monica, but it couldn't be you, right?"

• lucrative career as a surgeon before he started making little videos and posting them online.
• so his father, a marketing executive at an IT company, agreed to invest in the
  newly formed Lonelygirl15 production company. Beckett immediately called Rose
• In return, she had to stay home as much as possible and wear sunglasses and a hat when she went out. For Rose, it was a dream come true – she was a working actress. She just couldn't tell anyone.
• $500 a week to play Bree full time

• "I don't want you to ever set foot in another TGI Fridays," he said,
  explaining that he'd pay her ^#14
  $500
  a week to play Bree full time
  . ^#13
  In
  return, she had to stay home as much as possible and wear sunglasses and a hat
  when she went out. For Rose, it was a dream come true – she was a working
  actress. She just couldn't tell anyone.
  

• ^#17
  "I
  don't want you to ever set foot in another TGI Fridays," he said,
  
  explaining that he'd pay her ^#16
  
  $500
  
  
  a
  week to play Bree full time
  
  . ^#15
  
  In
  
  
  return,
  she had to stay home as much as possible and wear sunglasses and a hat
  
  
  when
  she went out. For Rose, it was a dream come true – she was a working
  
  
  actress.
  She just couldn't tell anyone.
• MATTHEW FOREMSKI, the 18-year-old son of a Silicon Valley tech reporter, dug up an old version of Rose's MySpace page. She'd deleted it when she became Bree, but Google cached a copy, and Foremski posted the link to his father's blog. Within 48 hours, The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and a slew of TV stations ran the story.
• 
  • on 2008-04-17 Puccak07
    Wow, even though something is deleted there are still traces of it that can be retrieved and viewed. This is a little bit creepy that this can be done. The internet may not be as safe as it appears. I don't trust it, and reading this is making me trust it less and less.
• but Google cached a copy
• But the fans – raised on the unreality of reality TV and with the role-playing
  ethos of the Web – seemed to take the revelation in stride.
• If you want to talk to Jessica Rose, you can go to her MySpace page. If you want
  to keep talking to Bree, use this email."
• Fair enough," the fan wrote back, and then went on to tell Bree the latest news
  in his life. To many, it didn't seem to matter whether she was real or not. A
  number of posts appeared on YouTube denouncing the series, but many more
  responded with variations of this simple statement: If you don't like it, don't
  watch.